Please create an account to participate in the Slashdot moderation system

 


Forgot your password?
Close
typodupeerror
×
Television

Submission + - Matt Groening Final Boss in Simpsons EA Game (filefront.com) 1

Submitted by
eldavojohn
eldavojohn writes: "Announced at E3, Mr. Groening will be the final boss in the Simpsons game. Mr. Groening commented on the game: "They did a send-up of videogames. It's a videogame about videogames; and I'm in the videogame. I'm a boss that you have to fight at the end of the game. It was really fun recording a million ways of dying, going 'UGGH, ARGGH, EUURGH!'""
The Internet

Submission + - Microsoft Acquires Health Search Engine, Medstory

Submitted by
ReadWriteWeb
ReadWriteWeb writes: "Microsoft has acquired Medstory, a vertical search engine for health information. Medstory's search results are thoroughly categorized and the types of sources are clearly identified, so that users can get clinical trials and research materials if they wish. It's a great example of how a vertical search engine can offer 'value add' features that are specific to the domain. NYTimes says that Medstory's "search software applies artificial intelligence techniques to medical and health information in medical journals, government documents and on the Internet."

While the web-based health industry is a potentially huge market (just ask Jim Clark of Netscape and Healtheon fame), which probably is the main reason for Microsoft's interest in it, an equally valid reason could be that Microsoft wants to corner the vertical search engine niche for health — before Google gets to it."
User Journal

Journal Journal: Strange Unregistered Domains

Journal by gbulmash
Every once in a while, I go hunting for odd domains that are still available. For example, if you believe that junk e-mail is caused by the spirits of dead aliens, you might want to register spamintology.com. It's available (or was when I wrote this) and it's one of 25 I found while wasting some time today.
Media (Apple)

Submission + - appleTV officially delayed

Submitted by
vic_at_anything_digi
vic_at_anything_digi writes: "It seems that the rumors regarding the ship date for Apple's forthcoming media extender on are true: appleTV is officially delayed until mid-march. I pre-ordered mine a few weeks back and received an e-mail notification of the delay today at 6:50:52 PM CST. Is this an issue with the airport extreme which is already shipping or signs of something more serious?"
Encryption

Apple's iTunes DRM Dilemma 282

Posted by kdawson from the how-FairPlay-works dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Understanding how Apple's FairPlay DRM works helps to answer a lot of questions: why it hasn't been replaced with an open, interoperable DRM that anyone can use, why Apple isn't broadly licensing FairPlay, and why the company hasn't jumped to add DRM-free content from indie artists to iTunes."
The Internet

Submission + - CGI Webserver ported to 8052 Microcontroller

Submitted by Marvin TPA
Marvin TPA writes: Adam Dunkels' astonishing open-source uIP v0.9 TCP/IP stack has recently been ported to run on the tiny 8-bit 8052 microcontroller. Murray R. Van Luyn's implementation runs the full CGI Webserver application on an SOIC microcontroller chip no larger than a postage stamp! Using just over 1200 bytes of RAM the port delivers SLIP protocol connectivity, and when combined with a Realtek RTL8019AS network interface card it connects directly to the web via Ethernet.
Announcements

Submission + - Gutenberg nanotechnology = printable electronics

Submitted by hakaii
hakaii writes: Using a process akin to the printing press, researchers have managed to bypass the need for epitaxial growth or wafer bonding to integrate wide ranging classes of dissimilar semiconducting nanomaterials onto substrates for the purpose of constructing heterogeneous, three dimensional electronics. The researchers at the University of Illinois have alreday used their printing process to fabricate ultrathin multilayer stacks of high-performance metal oxide semiconductor field-effect transistors (MOSFETs), high electron mobility transistors (HEMTs), thin-film transistors (TFTs), photodiodes, and other components. more: http://www.nanowerk.com/spotlight/spotid=1528.php
The Matrix

Submission + - Do we need to make voting mandatory?

Submitted by
gd23ka
gd23ka writes: "Australia and Belgium force their electorate to the ballot boxes. Disaffected in Australia and don't want to get out of bed on election day? Pay a fine or go to jail or at least explain why you couldn't come. With these laws on their books both countries enjoy a high percentage of participation in their elections. Proponents say that forced participation in the elections strengthens democracy. What are your thoughts on the matter? You can read Slate's opinion piece first or tell me right away: Is mandatory voting a good idea for America?"
Space

Submission + - Northern Lights choreographer revealed

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Recently four spacecraft, part of the European Space Agency's Cluster mission, provided a behind-the-scenes look at what choreographs the auroras or Northern Lights (at the South Pole they're called Southern Lights). Researchers have known that relative static electric fields, which hover parallel to Earth's magnetic fields, play an important role in the acceleration of electrons that causes the auroras to shine. From the Space.com article: In the recent study, one of the spacecraft crossed the auroral arc at high altitude in the Earth's magnetotail. As expected, it detected the U-shaped structure when crossing the boundary within the plasma sheet. Just 16 minutes later another Cluster spacecraft crossed the same boundary and revealed an asymmetric S-shaped structure, which was a surprise since the S-shape was thought to arise at the polar cap boundary. Within that 16-minute period, the plasma density and associated electric currents plummeted at the plasma boundary. So the boundary ended up resembling the steep drop-off in particle density between the aurora edge and the polar cap." This fits with the theory set forth in 2004 by Göran Marklund from the Alfvén Laboratory, that U-shaped circuits form at a plasma boundary between a region within the magnetotail at equatorial latitudes and one at higher latitudes and the S-shapes occur at the boundary between the plasma sheet (at the inner edge of the auroral oval) and the polar cap.
User Journal

Journal Journal: My Realization That I Am a WoW Care Bear 9

Journal by WillAffleckUW

Well, my 15 yo son finally convinced me to let him get World of Warcraft (not the new version), on the proviso that he pays for half of the monthly (six-month discounted) charge for it. Since we both had used Diablo II and liked it, and he had paid out of pocket for his two-week free trial.

Anyway, long story short, I'm reading thru the manual (yeah, I do that, also got an Atlas) and I realize, suddenly, after having played for a few weeks, that I am a Care Bear.
Security

Submission + - Trojan that Harnesses Webmail

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: A new trojan pretending to be a video postcard is able to inject messages directly into your outgoing email as you send it if you use webmail from Tiscali, Earthlink, Comcast, Bellsouth, Gmail, Rambler, FastMail, Care2, mail.com, Hotmail, Yahoo, Lycos, AOL, or mail.ru. In addition, it is able to inject text into postings posted to bulletin boards like vBulletin and phpBB and also IM messages.
Microsoft

Submission + - Open-source vs. Microsoft in Australian University

Submitted by
AlexGr
AlexGr writes: "ZDNet Australia, By David Braue Organizations considering a change of productivity suites may do well to follow the example of Queensland University of Technology (QUT), which has taken a cautious approach to Microsoft Office 2007 and instead focused on sprucing up its back-end messaging environment. The university, which has more than 40,000 students in a variety of disciplines, began revisiting its messaging environment — a concatenation of standalone best-of-breed products that were poorly integrated — after a Gartner review suggested it encourage collaboration by embracing unified messaging. http://www.zdnet.com.au/insight/software/soa/Despi te_open_source_ideology_QUT_embraces_Microsoft_int egration/0,139023769,339273682,00.htm"
Google

Submission + - Google: Don't blame heat for disk drive failures

Submitted by
BobB
BobB writes: "Temperatures exceeding 100 degrees Fahrenheit may not be damaging to disk drives, according to new research by Google engineers which casts doubt on previous findings linking heat to elevated failure rates. After studying five years worth of monitoring statistics from Google's massive data centers, researchers say they could find no consistent pattern linking failure rates to high temperatures or high utilization levels. http://www.networkworld.com/news/2007/022607-googl e-disk-drives.html"
Biotech

Submission + - Evolution by Any Other Name

Submitted by jakosc
jakosc writes: Plos Biology has an interesting article on the avoidance of the word 'Evolution' in scientific papers and grants. In 'Evolution by Any Other Name: Antibiotic Resistance and Avoidance of the E-Word' Antonovics et al. claim that "In spite of the importance of antimicrobial resistance, we show that the actual word "evolution" is rarely used in the papers describing this research. Instead, antimicrobial resistance is said to "emerge," "arise," or "spread" rather than "evolve." Moreover, we show that the failure to use the word "evolution" by the scientific community may have a direct impact on the public perception of the importance of evolutionary biology in our everyday lives."
Censorship

Submission + - Power-Grab: ICANN to Become Internet "Word Pol

Submitted by
Robin Gross of IP Justice
Robin Gross of IP Justice writes: "Top-Level Domain Policy to Bypass National Sovereignty and Free Speech
Civil Society Proposes Amendment to Protect Civil Liberties and Innovation

ICANN's Non-Commercial Users Constituency (NCUC) submitted a proposal to protect freedom of expression and innovation in the introduction of new generic top-level domains (gTLDs). ICANN's policy council, the Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO), is currently developing policy recommendations to regulate the introduction of new top-level domain names on the Internet.

NCUC is troubled by the GNSO's draft recommendation to create string selection criteria that would prevent the registration of a new gTLD string that contains a controversial word or idea. In the 13 February 2007 GNSO draft report , proposed Term of Reference 2(v) of the string criteria states that "the string should not be contrary to public policy (as set out in advice from the Governmental Advisory Committee)".

According to the GAC guidelines: "No new gTLD string shall promote hatred, racism, discrimination of any sort, criminal activity, or any abuse of specific religions or cultures. ... If the GAC or individual GAC members express formal concerns about a specific new gTLD application, ICANN should defer from proceeding with the said application until GAC concerns have been addressed to the GAC's or the respective government's satisfaction."

Unless reformed, this ICANN policy will prevent anyone in the world from being able to use controversial words like "abortion" or "gay" in a new gTLD if a single country objects to their use. The proposal would further prevent the use of numerous ordinary words like "herb" and "john" in a string since they can have an illegal connotation in certain contexts.

In addition to any country in the world being able to stop a new gTLD string, ICANN staff would also be able to prevent any idea that it deemed too controversial to exist in the new domain space. The 13 Feb. proposal (Term of Reference 2(x)) gives ICANN staff the important job of making preliminary determinations as to whether a string is inappropriate and who the "legitimate sponsor" of a domain name (such as .god) should be.

"The 13 Feb proposal would essentially make ICANN the arbiter of public policy and morality in the new gTLD space, a frightening prospect for anyone who cares about democracy and free expression," said Robin Gross, Executive Director of IP Justice, an NCUC member organization. "The proposal would give ICANN enormous power to regulate the use of language on the Internet and lead to massive censorship of controversial ideas."

NCUC proposes to amend the GNSO draft policy so that only the legal restrictions in the national jurisdictions of the string application in question will apply to the particular string. Under NCUC's proposal, national law would be the measure for what words are permitted to be registered in any particular nation, not ICANN policy.

NCUC's proposal recognizes the reality that there are competing standards of morality and competing public policy objectives and that ICANN should not try to set a universal standard. NCUC's amendment better protects freedom of expression, since only those words and ideas that are actually outlawed in a particular nation could not be registered in that nation.

Instead of engaging in censorship in the new domain space, ICANN policy should respect international freedom of expression guarantees. Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights guarantees that "everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers." ICANN should adhere to Article 19 and permit the registration of lawful, but controversial strings in the new gTLD space.

Besides free expression, NCUC's proposal also protects national sovereignty, and the right of nations, not ICANN, to decide what words may be used in their jurisdictions. The current draft report would usurp the right of an individual nation to permit the use of words in its own country that are controversial in other countries.

Rather than blanketly applying 240 nations' cumulative restrictions on speech onto every country, NCUC's proposal is more narrowly tailored to limit only those words that are actually illegal where registered.

Milton Mueller, Professor at Syracuse University School of Information Studies and NCUC Executive Committee member said, "There has always been a danger that ICANN's exclusive control of Internet identifiers would be used as leverage to enforce extraneous policies. ICANN needs to stick to its narrow, technical coordination role, We need to protect the Internet from globalized, centralized regulation."

The current GNSO proposal is further flawed because it is framed from an irrelevant 1883 treaty on trademarks that is inappropriate, both because of its archaic origin and because trademark law is intrinsically a narrow legal paradigm that does not extend to a full vision of societal benefits and rights. Most notably, trademark law is not designed to regulate non-commercial speech, which is vast majority of online communication.

NCUC's proposal to amend Term of Reference 2 (v) is the main proposal in a group of 5 NCUC proposals to reform the policy recommendations in the 13 Feb. GNSO draft report. It is possible that ICANN's GNSO Policy Council will vote on draft final report as soon as the next ICANN board meeting in Lisbon in late March 2007.

NCUC urges individuals and organizations that are concerned with protecting free expression and innovation to contact ICANN Board Members and their national representative of the Government Advisory Committee (GAC) to express their out the current draft and support for NCUC's amendments.

If you live in the United States, your representative on the GAC is Suzanne Sene from the US Commerce Department. Suzanne Sene can be contacted via email to SSene[at]ntia.doc.gov

The ICANN GAC representatives from other countries are listed here:
http://gac.icann.org/web/contact/reps/index.shtml

The ICANN Board of Directors is listed here:
http://www.icann.org/general/board.html

*Links to relevant documents:*
GNSO Draft Final Report on the Introduction of New Generic Top-Level Domains:
http://gnso.icann.org/drafts/GNSO-PDP-Dec05-FR13-F EB07.htm

NCUC proposal (Feb. 2007) to amend the draft report:
http://www.ipjustice.org/ICANN/drafts/022207.html

NCUC Comments on Fall 2006 Draft Report
http://www.ipjustice.org/ICANN/NCUC_Comments_on_Ne w_gTLDs.pdf

Internet Governance Project Alert:
"Will the UN Take Over the Internet" Through ICANN?
http://internetgovernance.org/news.html#UNTakeOver InternetThroughIcann_022207

GNSO Council Webpage on Intro of New gTLD Policy:
http://gnso.icann.org/issues/new-gtlds/

*About the NCUC:*
The Non-Commercial Users Constituency (NCUC) is the part of the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) that represents the interests of noncommercial Internet users. NCUC is a voting member of the Generic Names Supporting Organization (GNSO), which develops policy and advises the ICANN Board on matters regarding generic top-level domains on the Internet. NCUC develops and supports Internet policies that favor noncommercial use on the Internet. The NCUC is made up of 40 civil society organizations from around the world and maintains a website at http://www.ncdnhc.org/ ."

Slashdot Top Deals

"Engineering without management is art." -- Jeff Johnson

Close